the state began working in 2016 with civil society organizations to develop, by 2024, a “National Action Plan for the Eradication of Statelessness.” 4. Finally, in November 2018, Cote d'Ivoire adopted two new laws to prevent statelessness. The first was the Civil Status law, meant to reform the process of obtaining birth registration documents. With this new law, the once cumbersome process of obtaining birth registration, which excluded thousands of people from the system, has been simplified and decentralized. The second was the Special Law, which restored identity for those who have been without any form of documentation and therefore at risk of statelessness. The implementation of these two laws -- as well as the process of renewing national identity cards -- began in early 2020. Civil society input, as part of its implementation advocacy, has been crucial to government’s efforts to institute these reforms. Cote d’Ivoire now has a dedicated local civil society coalition that has built expertise on the issue of statelessness in Africa, has remained committed to ensuring that the government implements the reforms it has put in place, and is able to share its expertise with counterparts in other African countries. For instance, CICA has now become an active player in broader efforts to see the African Union adopt a “Protocol to the African Charter on the Right to Nationality in Africa.” But working with civil society to support implementation of a decision is not enough. Efforts should also be made to build the capacity of civil society, in order to focused on constituency building and to ensure the sustainability of the gains made. All of this is a good example of how advocacy not only supports implementation of judgments or ensures legal and administrative reforms, but also works towards other goals in the process – creating a constituency of engaged actors, building skills locally to continue the body of work around the subject matter of the litigation. Still, significant gaps remain. Many people in Cote d’Ivoire continue to lack documentation, are stateless, or remain at risk of being stateless. Implementing new laws and administrative reforms will require continued work by local civil society, engagement and monitoring by the national human rights commission, ongoing coordination with international partners, and continued commitment from successive Ivorian governments. And, as noted, ongoing engagement by the ACHPR is crucial to ensuring state compliance with its decision as well. While the Commission has had some limited engagement with the government on the need to implement its decision, such engagement has been driven mainly by civil society and litigants. It is important, then, that the Commission uses the provisions of its own rules relating to implementation. such as appointing a rapporteur for specific communications, providing information in its activity report to the African Union on the status of implementation, and requiring information from states on what they have done to ensure implementation of decisions. It is therefore critical for the Commission to engage the Ivorian government on the status of implementation of its decision, especially to identify the gaps that remain at the national level. Alpha Sesay is an Advocacy Officer with the Open Society Justice Initiative. Amon Dongo is a Program Lead with the Observatoire National de l'Equité et du Genre. 5